Kennesaw State students protest nudity in theater production
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Posted 7:24AM on Tuesday, April 16, 2002
KENNESAW - A student production of ``The Grapes of Wrath'' that features nudity has sparked a protest from offended students at Kennesaw State University in Cobb County. <br>
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About 500 students petitioned the school's theater department for a ban on nudity in all productions. But the university president has backed the theater department and supported the play, which opens tonight. <br>
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``The Grapes of Wrath'' is an adaptation of John Steinbeck's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. It chronicles the journey of the Joad family from Oklahoma to the migrant camps of California during the Great Depression. <br>
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In the first act, Al Joad strips and jumps into a pool of water to bathe. At the end, Rose of Sharon breast-feeds a starving man after her child is stillborn. Both scenes are described by school officials as ``brief moments of nudity.'' <br>
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Assistant theater professor Laurence Ruth says nudity is essential to the story, but NOT the primary concern. <br>
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Kennesaw State student 26-year-old Rachel Brooker organized the campaign against nudity and says she thinks nudity is inappropriate in the production. <br>
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College President Betty Siegel met with Brooker and other students but says she supports the department's choice. <br>
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This will be the first play with nudity ever produced at the 14,000-student school.